


Hang Me On the Line

by dizzy



Category: Farscape RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-06
Updated: 2011-02-06
Packaged: 2017-10-16 01:05:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/166790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dizzy/pseuds/dizzy





	Hang Me On the Line

Ben is married.

Claudia reminds herself of that at least once a week. She's ashamed that she has to. She's ashamed sometimes at the things she does to get his attention, to check and see if he's still looking.

He always looks.

*

The blankets they use are soft, and Claudia burrows under it to ward off the chill of the room while they get the cameras in place.

Ben gets into the bed behind her and suddenly there's no chill at all anymore. She feels warm all over.

She's got a wrap around her for modesty but her shoulders are bared. His chest presses against her and she feels his arm settle around her midsection. When he speaks his voice is so close, barely a whisper, just for her. "This okay?"

It's a question - one she needs to answer.

She forces a nod and a smile, pretending like she's not enjoying the contact quite so much. The hair on his chest tickles against her skin and she feels warmth swirl through her. She shifts back against him and it's one of those things she shouldn't do because he's a married man, but she has to know.

She feels him pressed against her. She hears the sharp intake of breath. "Sorry," she murmurs, but she has her answer.

*

Ben's on the second verse when she walks into the room. He's regaling the crew with a rousing rendition of American Pie, and she joins right in like they'd planned it.

No one else is phased because it's just Ben and Claudia, goofing off. They do it so often and so well.

Claudia's got her makeup done but she's not been to the costuming trailer yet. She's wearing shorts and her legs are bared and she sees Ben's gaze before he pulls it away. She drops down onto the chair beside him, sitting sideways and resting her feet on his lap. He takes it in stride. Gigi's there too. She has close-ups to shoot in an hour or so, dressed in jeans and a tank top and Chiana's makeup from the neck up.

Gigi sits cross-legged on the floor and makes Claudia run lines with her. Chiana has a monologue, and Gigi wants to iron in all of the Nebari quirks before the cameras start to roll.

Ben talks to one of the AD's. He's not facing Claudia, not paying her any outward attention, but he puts his hand on her ankle. His thumb rubs circles around the knob of bone and she wonders if he can see the goosebumps. She shifts in the seat, lets her heel slip against his leg, brush his crotch. Her gaze flickers over but he's still not looking at her. His grip on her foot tightens though, neither pushing her away nor letting her move.

*

Ben's not just married.

He's married with kids. He's got a daughter and a son that show up at least a couple of times a week. He's got a wife that calls him to remind him to pick up milk on his way home.  He's domestic. He's settled.

He's out of reach and Claudia tries not to be so bitter, tries not to resent so much that someone got him before she even had the chance.

Late at night in the comfort and privacy of her own bed, she thinks about what she'd do if she had him. It's never been quite so bad before. She's never wanted quite so much. The first year, it was attraction, it was fun. The second year, she saw potential. But now - being with him so often, knowing him as well as she's come to know him...

She won't admit that she's in love with him because she never wants to be the woman chasing after someone else's husband.

(She won't admit it, but that doesn't mean it isn't true.)

*

Claudia is exhausted, and wants nothing more than a straight week of sleeping in and doing nothing but catching up on all of the books she's put off reading and movies that she's put off watching. She's looked forward to this eagerly for weeks, except...

Except, this hiatus seems like a long and lonely time when she thinks about going so long without seeing Ben.

He's going back to America for the duration, skirting foreign residency laws and spending time with the family that she knows he misses. It's all he's talked about for the past few days - seeing his parents, his brothers, nieces and nephews, his closest friends that he's spent the past year living half a world away from.

"Going to miss me?" she says, teasing him. She's not expecting that warm smile and shy confession of yes. It jolts through her pleasantly.

*

Claudia has to relearn how to have free time.

She's got a couple of guest spots lined up, enough to ensure she won't go without a paycheck. She gets in touch with friends that she hasn't seen since the last season started, spends a few weeks with her family.

She goes on a couple of dates, but her mind is elsewhere. She doesn't answer when either calls her back. Her roommate mocks her, but Claudia's not bothered. Her priorities have shifted, she explains. She wouldn't have time for a relationship once filming starts again anyway.

*

On the third week, she gets the first text message. It comes at eleven in the morning. She's just come from the gym, hair damp and sticking to the back of her neck. She turns the water on and waits for it to heat, digging through her clothes to find something clean to wear for her afternoon lunch

 _stop snoozin_

She doesn't recognize the number at first. It's not the same phone that he uses in Australia, but there aren't too many people that would send her messages internationally.

 _wide awake. i've been working out. we're not all lazy bums_ , she writes back.

She leaves her phone on the table and goes to shower. When she gets done and comes back, she has two messages waiting on her.

 _i did some remote control lifts today while i watched a game. that counts right?_  
 _claude?_  
                                                                                              
She sits on her bed, towel tucked around her body and writes back.

It's just a conversation. Just a few text messages. There's nothing intimate about text messages. Words on a screen.

 _sorry. just got out of shower._

She hesitates, and then hits send. It's only the truth; nothing descriptive or suggestive about it. And yet... she bites her lip when she thinks of Ben reading it, of what might cross his mind.

Her phone buzzes.

 _guess you worked up a sweat._

 _well i got a peak at aeryns costumes for next season and i think i need to get in shape_

 _i don't think its possible to be any more in shape than you are claude_

That puts a warm feeling in the pit of her stomach. She pulls her knees up and rests her phone against them, grinning down at the device.

She types a sentence and then erases it.

She tries again, but deletes that one, too.

Two minutes pass, and she is still trying to decide what to say back. Her phone buzzes again.

 _gotta get the kids in bed... have a good workout_

She puts her phone aside and goes to get dressed.  

*

Claudia doesn't hear from Ben for a few weeks. She's not surprised; the messages were nice, but they don't have the sort of relationship where they talk outside of work constantly.

Maybe she'd like to, but she understands the reasons why they don't.

That's why it's a surprise when her phone rings one day. It's another unfamiliar number and she thinks about letting it go to voicemail but she knows who it is; knows before she hits the call button. "Hello?"

"Claude," Ben says. His voice sounds tinny and distant, a bad connection. She sits on her couch, perched on the edge of the cushion, like she doesn't want to relax too much. Like she's afraid of what this phone call could be about. His voice is casual though, relaxed. "Hey! How you doing?"

"I'm fine... did something happen?" she asks.

"Happen? What? No, no, things are good, things are great. Enjoying some of that Tennessee sunshine... went fishing with my brothers yesterday, it was a good time," he says. "Took my boy, it was his first time."

She can hear the truth in his voice, how happy he sounds. She smiles. "Did he catch anything?"

"Not a thing... spent most of the day playing with the worms. Had to stop him from eating one," Ben says. "You ever been fishing, Claude?"

"Never," she admits. "Somehow it just hasn't... ah..."

"You don't think it'd be fun," he guesses. "I bet you'd like it, though. It's relaxing."

"Like yoga?" Her voice is dry with a hint of laughter, because her frequent attempts at doing yoga on set - and how short lived they usually are - are well known.

"Better than yoga, I swear," Ben says. "Nothing better than packing up a cooler with beer and some lunch - fried chicken, potato salad, a pie for dessert - and hitting the water in a boat."

"You know, I've always seen one minor issue with that..."

"What's that?"

"The lack of a proper toilet."

"Figured you were gonna say baiting the hook or scaling..." Ben laughs. "But I shouldn't be surprised."

"But you haven't told me how that works..."

"Uh, well," Ben obviously hedges the issue.

"Come on..." She says, voice lilting.

"It was just the boys today, so we roughed it."

"Oh, god." Claudia covers her face with her hand. "You just pissed off the edge of the boat, didn't you?"

"Just the boys!" He tries to defend his actions. "We were in Neil's little motorboat, and we couldn't scoot back to shore every time we had to go."

"This is why I will never go fishing," Claudia swears.

"Fine, fine..." There's background noise behind him, someone speaking. "Hold on a sec."

The sound is clearer as whoever is talking approaches, then muffled when he apparently covers the speaker of the phone.

He comes back a moment later. "Claude? I gotta go."

She's still not sure why he called, but she's smiling every time she thinks about it for the rest of the day.

*

Hiatus is over but there's no need for Aeryn Sun on set, so she finds herself with an extra week.

She wants to be back, though. She wants to be back on set. She wants to see him.

She'd hoped that over the break, this might go away. She'd hoped she might meet someone, and she'd tried; there were a few dates, one that didn't end until the following morning. He was a nice man. He'd wanted to see her again.

She hadn't answered his calls.

None of them are Ben, and while she won't be the woman who sits around pining, she also won't jump into something just because she wants to forget him, either.

She thinks of last season, the many excuses to be close to him. In bed together, touching each other, the way his ass felt against her palm, the warmth of his breath against her cheek just before he kissed her.

This Crichton is in a different place with Aeryn, and there won't be any of that. The knowledge frustrates her. She's let herself get just the faintest taste of what it would be like, and she wants more.

But Ben is married.

*

There's a knock on her door at half past eight on Monday evening. She's home alone, her roommate out, and she answers it in running shorts and a t-shirt.

She's not expecting Ben. If she had been, she'd have probably put on something different, ran a brush through her hair... sure, he's seen her at all hours of the morning and night, sleep-deprived and utterly exhausted, but that was then and this feels different.

"Claudia," he says, and he looks so warm, and his voice sounds so nice and deep and familiar. "Hey, I hope I'm not interrupting anything..."

"Of course not," she says, stepping back. "Come in."

He doesn't move forward, shows no signs of entering her apartment. "I just came from set, and I was headed home but then I started to think - it was weird, without you there today. Weird to be back and you not be there."

She can't help but smile at that. "I missed it. That sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? But I did."

"I missed you," he says, and then he has a look on his face like he's not sure where those words came from. "Look, I-"

"Ben." She says it to stop him from talking. "Don't."

He looks down and his shoulders drop and then he looks back up. "I missed you, Claude. Kept thinking about you..."

"Don't do this," she says, one last attempt at keeping the lid on this thing they've both been stepping around.

"I know, I know. And I don't know what to do about it, either. But..."

"I missed you, too."

She says it and then it's just out there and neither of them knows what the next step is.

"Oh," Ben says, trying not to look too happy and failing.

"I'll be on set next week," Claudia says, her voice soft.

He nods, straightening up, stepping back, out of the doorway. "I'll guess I'll see you then."

*

He calls her on Wednesday.

"You gotta come save me," he says.

She's eating lunch, poking at a salad with her fork. "You mean you need Aeryn Sun to save you."

"No, I need Claudia Black to come save me, because Gigi will not shut up about-"

"Is that Claudia?" Gigi pipes in from the background. "Did you really call her? Give me the phone, give- Claudia?"

"What on earth are you doing to poor Ben?"

"We've forbidden him from saying your name, that's what we've done," Gigi says.

Claudia laughs, warmth flushing through her. "Is that so?"

"It is, and you-" Gigi's voice is cut off abruptly. The one phone's dead and Claudia figures that means Ben has won this round.

It rings a few minutes later: Ben's number again. "Claudia? Sorry about that. I managed to escape back to my trailer."

"So..." She spears a lettuce leaf and crunches down on it. "You're talking about me, then?"

"Just uh.. aw, hell. It's just weird. I keep turning around to tell you stuff and you're not here," he sulks.

"Just a week," she says.

"You know..."

"Yeah?"

"You could come have lunch on set tomorrow."

She pauses to think about it. "That bad, huh?"

"It's not... I just... yeah," he admits. "Yeah. I want to see you."

"Come over tonight," she says, and she knows she's sealing her fate.

*

Dinner.

It's not a date.

It's two friends.

She wears jeans, not a dress; she puts on makeup, but just a bit. She does her hair, curls it gently, puts a barrette in. She looks good. She knows she looks good. He likes this shirt on her, he's told her before.

Her stomach does flips when she hears the knock on the door.

He looks good. He's looking at her like he thinks she looks good, and she likes that.

"I've made pasta, I hope you like it..." She says, rubbing her hands against her thighs, a sign of nerves. "Do you want a beer?"

"Yeah," he says. "Yeah. Beer would be good."

He follows her into the kitchen.

*

They talk, and they eat, and it seems fine. It is fine. They laugh, and he tells her what's been happening on set, tells her stories about his kids during the hiatus. His eyes shine so brightly when he talks about them, how his daughter is already a soccer whiz, all the new things his son is learning.

"It sounds like you had a good time," she says, taking a bite of her meal. They're both eating slowly, drawing it out.

"Yeah... missed this place, though. I know it's only been a couple of years, but it feels like home here now. I missed..." His eyes flicker up to meet hers. "I missed it."

"Well, now you'll be able resume your normal life. Early mornings, late night-"

"Talking puppets..."

"Crazy co-workers."

"Leather. Wearing nothing but leather."

"Hey, I'm not complaining about the leather," Claudia smirks. Most of the cast and crew agree with her that Ben in leather is not a thing you complain about.

"Well... maybe I shouldn't either," he says, and the heat in his gaze is new. He's not usually so blunt.

She licks the taste of the pasta sauce from her lips and tries to veer the conversation back to safer territory. "How are things with... you know who?"

"Oh, my least favorite person on set?" Ben makes a face. "It's civil, so far. We haven't butted heads too much."

"That's good to hear," Claudia agrees. "I'm sure your patience will last... oh, at least a week. Until the sleep deprivation really starts to sink in."

"Okay, maybe I am insane," Ben admits. He lifts his beer bottle to his mouth and Claudia tries not to watch too closely.

"Maybe we all are, to be so invested in this," Claudia agrees.

She meets his eyes over the table and smiles. They can do this.

*

They do fine, right up to the moment he has to say goodnight.

They stand in front of the doorway and he's looking at her like he wants to speak and she knows if he says it again she won't have the willpower to stop him this time.

He doesn't say anything, though. He steps in and cups the back of her neck and kisses her. His mouth is warm and soft on hers, leading but not demanding, and she opens to it. She wraps her arms around his neck and holds on for dear life, her mouth moving against his.

When the kiss ends, he doesn't pull away.

"We can't," she says, and she feels like she's going to cry because what she wants is so close, it's right here in front of her. "You have a wife. Children."

"I know, I know," he says, and he sounds just as conflicted as she does, his voice rough.

"We've held out for this long," she reminds him, but her hands tell a different story, fingers carding through his hair, thumb pressing just below his ear in a way that makes his breath hitch. She likes that. She likes getting that reaction from him. She wants to explore that more but she can't, she can't. "It's been... years. We've gone years without...."

"Giving in," Ben fills in the words for her. "I know. I just want to be around you. I don't know what's too much and what's... all right. I just want to be around you all the time."

His lips brush the corner of her mouth and she turns into it, last vestiges of restraint tumbling away. She kisses him hard, so tired of wanting and not having when he's right here in front of her telling her that he wants it too.

She reaches down and takes his hand and leads him back inside.  

*

He's just as good as she'd imagined.

All those hints, those brief touches, when his mouth and his hands were on her, they'd been nothing in the context of the moment - cameras and lights on them, crew all around - they can revisit them now. They can revisit them alone now.

They lay beside each other on her couch, legs tangling. She can see the outline of his hard-on against his jeans, curving along his thigh. She puts a hand on him and watches his face to gauge his reaction. He lets her look and doesn't shy away, lets her see how much he likes it.

She kisses him while she undoes the button and zipper, sliding her hand. Her eyes widen when she encounters nothing but the heat and humidity of his body, coarse hair and bare skin. "Ben..." She smirks at him.

He flushes red (redder) and shrugs. "Personal choice."

"I like it," she says, nudging him back until he lies down. She straddles his thighs and tugs out his cock, looking down at her hand on his shaft, staring her fill.

"You too," he says, pushing at her shirt. She gets the hint and stands up to undress. He starts to follow but she shakes her head and pushes him back down.

Sometimes, she likes to put on a show. She likes how men react to her body, especially how this man reacts. She undresses gracefully, leaving on her panties and her bra.

He reaches for her this time, impatient. He pulls her close and she stretches out over him, arms on either side of his head, finding his mouth with hers. They kiss long and deep and she can feel him against her stomach, making her clench inside, dampness sudden between her legs. She can't stop the sound that it draws from her mouth.

His hands are on her ass, under her panties, pushing them down. "Want you," he says into her kiss, his tongue sliding alongside hers and stealing her ability to reply.

"I can tell," she replies, breathless.

Her panties are gone then and she pauses to let him unsnap her bra, shrugging it off until it falls forward onto his chest. He laughs and his eyes are so bright and so blue and everything about this is so good. She lets the guilt and the hesitation go, kisses him joyfully and then gets to her feet. She reaches down for his hand and he holds his back out to her as he gets up, walking into the bedroom together.

 *

They’re working up a sweat, a light sheen on his skin that she can’t help but lick. Her tongue draws a line over his hip, nosing at the base of his cock and breathing him in. She wants to do more but her concentration is shot because he’s got two fingers buried inside of her and she’s rocking on them, riding them but he won’t let her come. She looks over her shoulder at him and loves that grin on his face, evil and delicious, toying with her.

She loves the robust feeling of his cock in her hand, too, her fingers stretched around him, grasping. He’s so responsive, everything he’s feeling is right there on his face and she has to lean down and lick just to hear that little choked groan again. He tastes good in her mouth and she gives a long hard suck.

“Claude, honey,” he says, grasping her shoulder, pushing with intent, and she gets that message loud and clear.

She’s got the condom in her other hand and it takes willpower to pull away from him long enough to rip it open and slide it onto him, smoothing it down. She sits up tall and he grasps her hips with sticky fingers, palms up the long line of her back before she turns around to face him again.

She puts her hands on his shoulder and waits for him to reach between them and angle himself for her to slide down. His eyes shut, a blessed out look on his face, lips parted slightly.

The stretch of him inside of her gives her pause and she stays still on him for a few seconds, long enough that he opens his eyes again to look at her questioningly. She reaches forward to press a palm to his cheek, her thumb on his bottom lip and he kisses it. It’s such a sweet gesture that it disarms her and she blinks back tears.

“Claudia?” He asks. She nods and starts to move.

*

Ten minutes later, her back is on the mattress and she’s got her arms wrapped around him, mouth open making noises that would embarrass her any other time, but so is he Her voice is muffled against his neck, the smell of his sweat and aftershave dizzying and delicious, and the way he's moving inside of her makes her clutch at his shoulders.

She can feel the restraint in him, the tension in his biceps and along the lines of his face, mouth set in a firm line. She can feel how he's trying to make it last, holding back.

She's ready, though. She wants this. She wants to feel him, feel his body over hers, and she wants to watch his face while he comes. She pants against his skin and then reaches up for a kiss, catching his groan with eager lips. It's messy and desperate; nothing screen-worthy, damp lips sliding together, Ben sucking her tongue into his mouth, a scrabbling give and take as he surges inside of her. "Come on," she says, half begging and half ordering, pushing herself over the edge. She's caught on the electric blue of his gaze as she comes, mouth open in a wordless cry, body shaking and clenching around him.

She can tell that his own orgasm catches him off guard, spurred by her own, his ability to withstand testing beyond his limits. She slides a hand through his hair and rocks her hips up to draw it out for him, feeling the jerk inside of her. He's beautiful like this, red-faced and sweaty and utterly shameless in his pleasure. Beautiful.

Afterward he slumps down against her, rolling to the side a little to avoid crushing her with his weight. She ignores the cooling dampness between her legs and reaches down to take the condom off of his softening cock, tossing it into the small bin beside the bed. His eyes are shut and his breathing is evening out slowly. She puts a hand on his chest and feels the tickle of damp hair and the thudding of his heart.

He reaches up and covers her hand with his.

*

Claudia wakes up alone, but she's not surprised. Ben isn't the type to sneak out the back door.

His last words linger though, almost as good as his presence in the bed beside her. She rolls over and clutches her pillow and smiles a stupidly happy smile.

She'd walked him to the door hours before, kissed him goodbye and tried to pretend like she didn't want to ask him to stay. He'd cupped her face in his hands, made her feel so small and so cherished, and kissed her and said, "I'm gonna talk to her today."

"Are you sure this is what you want?" She'd asked, guilt warring with the euphoria of the night.

"I'm in love with you. Maybe tonight... maybe we got the order a little wrong. I shouldn't have done this without telling her. But I wasn't sure you felt it, too."

She has to wrap her arms around him again, wanting the security of that embrace. "I do."

*

She doesn't hear from him but she has to be on set to pick up a script and for some costume fittings.

She can see Ben across the set and she lingers in the doorway for a few moments just to watch him. He's smiling, happy, and she thinks of the night before and the words he’d said to her.

He grins when he sees her, says something to the person he's talking to and then jogs over to her. "Hey," he says once he comes to a stop in front of her. "What are you doing here?"

"I got a call asking me to come in," she says. "Fittings or something."

"Uh huh," he grins.

"Stop that!" She can't help but grin back. "It's not an excuse. I really was called."

"I'm glad, either way."

She wants to touch him, but she can't. She glances around. Too many people, too obvious. "Have you..."

"Not yet," he says, understanding immediately that she's asking about Francesca. "Tonight. Claude... I don't know how this is gonna go. I think she... well, I don't know. She won't be happy."

"No," Claudia says, softly.

"But this is what's right." He reaches out and very briefly squeezes her hand. "I wouldn't be doing this if I wasn't sure."

She is almost awed at his faith in her, but she realizes that he's trusting his own judgment as much as he is her.

*

Ben looks exhausted when he shows up on her doorstep the next morning. Claudia leads him inside. "She's home," she murmurs, nodding toward her roommate's door. "We can go into mine."

He drops down onto her bed and rests his head on the pillow. She has to smile at the sight of him there, though she has the impression that not much else about the conversation that is about to happen will be a source of happiness.

"Told her everything," Ben says. "She's furious. Reacted about like I'd imagined. Doesn't understand why I can't just..."

He sighs and doesn't finish the sentence.

"Why you can't just what?"

"Resist you. Put my family first. And she's right. I'm being a piss poor father right now, doing things I swore I'd never do."

Claudia's stung by the words. She crosses her arms over her chest. He's not looking at her, rubbing his eyes with his hands.

"I asked her if she remembered what it felt like to be in love," he says. "To meet someone and want to spend every minute of every day with them. She said sure, but that's not what marriage is. Thing is - I think it is. We haven't had that in a while. She's mad at me for working and leaving her with the kids, I'm mad at her for being mad... kills me, thinking of what my parents will say, thinking of my kids having to grow up in two houses. Before you, I probably wouldn't have left her. She's right about that."

Claudia shoves away her own insecurities and forces herself to the realization that Ben's life and his marriage and whatever is happening are so much more than her. She sits down on the edge of the bed.

"Sorry, sorry," he mumbles. "I don't even know what I'm saying. I just wanted to see you."

"I'm here," she says, lying down beside him. He rolls onto his side and opens his eyes to look at her. There's stubble on his cheek and it prickles against her fingertips when she reaches out for him.

"I know you are," he says with a smile.

*

Claudia sits in the makeup trailer with her hair in curlers and her feet bare.

Ben is sitting across the room having his hair done. He's got a weathered script on his lap, brightly colored pages with notes inked in, and a pen in one hand. His brow is furrowed in concentration and it's the same sight she's laid eyes on a hundred times over the years but she still can't stop staring.

They spin her around and there's more tugging, pulling, spraying, working her back into Aeryn Sun after a long summer of just being Claudia. Aeryn feels like a second skin by now, comfortable and familiar, and she thinks of Aeryn's problems and maybe it should put hers in perspective only Aeryn isn't real and John Crichton didn't have a marriage that just got broken up.

"Hold still," her makeup girl says, turning her slightly. She's facing the mirror now and she catches a flash of bright blue and she has to smile.

Ben's married, and whatever they're venturing into is going to be far from the easiest path they could take, but Ben's still looking and that's all she needs right now.


End file.
